Since a plurality of different application programs are used on a single computer or on a plurality of different computers, particularly in a client-server type architecture, it frequently happens that information needs to be interchanged between a plurality of computer programs. For example, European patent EP-380 211 describes in general terms the communication of information between computer programs, and in particular between application programs run on a single computer or on a plurality of computers. According to that document, the transfer of information between programs comprises using a distributor program which forms lists containing selected interchange information, information codes, and the identity of an application program. When data is to be transferred between a plurality of application programs, a sending application program produces information together with a corresponding information code; the information and the code are transmitted to the distributor program which stores them in a list; and the program compares the information code with the information codes of its own list to determine whether it matches any of its information codes relating to a plurality of application programs. If the comparison gives a positive result, then the distributor program transmits the selected information to a second application program identified by the information code.
In order to enable such an operation to be performed, it is necessary for the selected information interchanged between one application program and another to be compatible, i.e. the information must be capable of being processed in each of the two application programs. To this end, either the information is in a format that is recognized by both application programs and which can be used by the distributor program, or else the information is subjected to format conversion before being transmitted to the distributor program and after being transmitted therefrom to the destination application program.
Given the problems of interchanging information between programs using incompatible formats, more and more use is being made of formats that are compatible with numerous application programs. For example, more and more file formats, i.e. presentations of information, are being used which are recognized by a large number of application programs. Thus, for interchanging documents, there exists a "portable document format" (PDF) created at the initiative of Adobe, which format is particularly useful for composite documents. For files dedicated to storing images in dot mode, there also exists a "tagged image file" (TIFF) format which is recognized by the vast majority of the application programs concerned.
However, the system described in the above-specified document does not enable complete documents to be interchanged, but only information taken from documents. In a computer operating system, "files" represent documents, which documents may be of any type (text, graphics, images, sound). According to a known definition: "A document is a vehicle for intelligible information, rich both in its content and in its form. It is simultaneously the message, its form, its presentation, and its vehicle".
Given the ever-increasing use of such documents in formats that are recognized by numerous application programs, recognizing the entire document is posing fewer and fewer problems. Nevertheless, interchanging documents requires knowledge about their medium which is a "computer file".
In computer operating systems (which do not perform the role of the above-mentioned document distributor program), a file is a data set comprising a file name together with a certain number of attributes, in particular a creation date, a security descriptor (determining who can use the file, what can be done with the file, . . . ), and attributes indicating how the file can be used (read only, archived, etc.) during operations managed by the operating system and having no bearing on content. Naturally, the file header, once its nature has been defined, may contain a certain amount of information concerning the format of the file, etc. Thus, graphic files include a standardized format header containing a certain amount of data defining the properties of the file (encoding rule, etc.).
Thus, whatever the operating system, that which represents the contents of a document is defined only by a file name which may be relatively short [12+3 characters in the "Windows" 3.1 system (registered trademark)] or relatively long [up to about 125 characters for the "Windows 95" system (registered trademark)]. Given this relatively large number of file name bytes, it would naturally be possible to define within this segment of 125 bytes a data structure conveying a certain amount of information. Under such circumstances, merely knowing the file name could give a certain amount of information about the file itself. However, the file name function and the information content function would not be separated and, in reality, it would therefore not be possible to extract information usable by the application program itself, unless each application program were to be specially coded.
Nevertheless, in known operating systems, there exists a structure which enables information to be classified on the basis of its content. Such operating systems comprise a "file managers" which builds a classification structure. For example, it is commonplace to classify documents formed in such-and-such a context with such-and-such an application program, etc. by using directories, subdirectories, etc. with access thereto optionally being authorized or refused for such-and-such an operator.
The above-mentioned problems of lack of information arise in particular in the field of electronic document management which is now considered as being an application. In their more elaborate forms, electronic document management systems essentially comprise a document base which merely comprises the document medium (computer files), a search index base which is a type of database management program, and one or more application programs enabling documents to be read, at least, and sometimes enabling new documents to be created. In particular, the database management program is intended to give access to documents as a function of their content which has been determined using specified criteria, often based on keywords.
In such electronic document management systems, information transfers of the type concerned are useful only when creating new documents, given that to consult a document, the database management program is used which, as a function of its selection criteria, gives access to the document and does not transfer information thereto. However, in an application program for electronically managing data, it can be advantageous to interchange documents with the document base and the search index base. A method of transferring information of the type described in above-mentioned document EP-380 211 can then be implemented, for example.
Consequently, given the present state of the art, and in the context of an operating system, implementing systems of the type described requires a plurality of application programs to be implemented, and when information is to be interchanged, it requires a distributor program to be implemented for interchanging the information. It is therefore necessary to use together, in the context of an operating system, at least three programs operating successively or simultaneously: two application programs which interchange information, and a distributor program. Naturally, when information transfers are frequent and always of the same type, they can be programmed to be performed directly by one application program to another, without using a distributor program, however such transfers are then extremely rigid since they must have been programmed previously and they must form part of the application programs. The information interchange is put into a format that is compatible with the operating system so that it can act as the distributor program between the applications. A simple example is the interchange of information via the "clipboard" which is to be found in a large number of computer operating systems.
In accordance with the invention, it has been observed that the information interchanged between various application programs is usually information of an extremely small number of types. Consequently, if the designation of a document also includes the association of a certain number of items of information within this small number of types, then a large number of information transfers become superfluous.
We consider an example illustrating the above remarks in the context of the "Windows" (registered trademark) operating system. The identification of a file comprises: a date (creation date), which date is usually input automatically but which can be modified; a file name which must be input by the operator and which is generally an element of information constituting an abbreviation reminiscent of the information content of the document; a location in the file system (directories and subdirectories) as selected by the user, generally on the basis of the current working location; and optionally other attributes. When the user has thus input the criteria relating to the file, it is difficult for a third party to know what is contained in a document represented by the computer file.
In contrast, if, as in the method of the invention, the file name corresponds to a summary in a few words of the content of the document, and if at least one name (of a person or of a corporation), in general a destination or a sender, is also associated with the file name and with a date representing the date of arrival or departure of the document, and given the location of the file (directory, subdirectory), a third party can rapidly discover the bare essentials about the document, and this relatively superficial knowledge can either make it unnecessary to consult documents that are manifestly irrelevant, or else, on the contrary, can give very fast access to the desired document without searching through a relational database using specified criteria (keywords).
The invention thus relates to such a system, i.e. a system in which data defining a "document" includes a certain amount of information relating to the document, said information comprising at least a date, a name, and a message, a particular directory or subdirectory name, and in hidden form a "computer file name" which may merely be a number in a list which does not contain duplicate numbers. Naturally, other information may be useful, for example the fact that the document is one that has been received or sent in a particular management context, the name of the creator of the document, another date, etc., however any additional information may require additional inputting and may be of limited interest only.
The above-mentioned "name-date-message" data preferably corresponds to the entries that have been used for many years in the mail registers of businesses; this makes the system understandable to all staff of a service, a business, or an association, since the staff can adapt easily to handling documents according to the invention since they are accessible simply on the basis of said "name-date-message" data.
Consequently, the invention relates to managing information transfers between application programs in such a manner that only genuinely useful transfers are performed. When a document comes in from the outside, it is clearly necessary to input a name, a message, and possibly also a date (the date may automatically be taken to be the present date). Nevertheless, before a document is created or while it is being created, the name and the associated message are defined, preferably with the name of the computer tool (i.e. the application program) which must be or which is being used for creating the document and which therefore receives this information.
In a system of the invention, the "distributor program" for distributing the above-mentioned document therefore contains a certain amount of basic information which can be transmitted directly without needing to come from another application program. This information is incorporated in a database and represents the majority of the information required by the application programs.
The role of the distributor program is advantageously performed directly by the operating system implemented on the computer. Under such circumstances, it can either be a genuine operating system which calls application programs when documents are to be made with such-and-such an application program, or else it may be a "multipart" operating system in which a "distributor" program which manages document designations in accordance with the invention calls application programs, sending them information and possibly receiving information from them, and classifying for conservation purposes any information which may optionally be transmitted to other application programs. In which case, the structure is one in which the distributor program forms an "outer layer" over the basic operating system of the computer, in a manner somewhat analogous to the situation in which the program "Windows" 3.1 (registered trademark) constitutes an "outer layer" over the "MS-DOS" (registered trademark) operating system.
Thus, according to the invention and because of the distributor program, the "file manager" of known operating systems is replaced by a genuine "database manager" of a particular type which associates data from its database with each document.